There’s only one conference in the world you can talk about the stock market on stage at lunch and then see Wiz Khalifa and Gym Class Heroes perform a blowout concert on the same stage by dinner.
That’s Future Proof. And there’s nothing like it.
That contrast captures what makes the event unique. Finance has always been a self-serious industry practiced behind closed doors inside marble conference rooms.
But Future Proof puts it on the beach, where attendees have no choice but to swap suits for board shorts.
It sounds unconventional, but as someone who’s personally made the jump from legacy media to new media, it feels representative of where the industry is going.
I had the opportunity to share the stage with my friend Sonali Basak, chief investment strategist at iCapital, for the first ever live recording of my podcast, Full Signal. We discussed the Federal Reserve, how investors can think about AI doomsday headlines and the best opportunities in the market right now.
(I’ll publish our conversation in the coming days. Subscribe on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube to tune in.)
I also moderated a panel with two investors who flew in from Miami — Fortuna Investments CEO Justus Parmar and a partner in his firm, Joseph Magazine, who is also an elected official as a Miami Beach city commissioner.
We talked about their America-first investment strategy, how investors can identify opportunities created by government policy and whether Miami is truly becoming “Wall Street South.”
These two conversations served as another reminder that the lines between the investing universe and everything else are blurring by the day.
The people who understand finance best increasingly have a pulse on politics, culture, and media.
This was the first time I had ever spoken onstage at a conference.
It felt that much more special because it’s an event I first knew as an enthusiastic attendee and fan, one of more than 5,000 financial professionals who make the trip to learn something new and meet good people.
The Future Proof and Ritholtz Wealth Management team is world-class, and while I’ve known them for some time, I felt nerves and flutters before both appearances.
Friends and strangers had generous things to say afterward, though in my head I kept wondering whether I had left the microphone damp from my clammy hands.
Progress, as I wrote last week, rarely feels as polished from the inside as it looks from the outside.
Between my two stage appearances and the 23 meetings I packed into two and a half days, I sat down with Mark Gochnour and Jake DeKinder for The Informed Investor, Dimensional Funds’ in-house podcast.
We discussed AI and markets, traditional versus new media, and my approach to long-term investing and stock picking.
LinkedIn News also interviewed me about running my own company, the ways a personal brand can accelerate a career, and what I would tell professionals who are nervous about publishing their work online.
That conversation felt like the through-line to everything else that happened this week.
For most of my career, my job was to observe and document financial markets, interview the biggest players and explain their ideas to readers.
I still do those things. But building Opening Bell Media has increasingly placed me inside the story, too.
Much of this I’ve unknowingly been preparing for by making myself extremely visible online for nearly a decade.
I’m only realizing as I write this just how much happened over the last couple days.
But that’s showbiz.
And that’s Future Proof.
You’re crushing it. Great stuff.